


heimweh.

by Quecksilver_Eyes



Series: We're not meant to be alone [14]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Drowning, F/F, Gen, M/M, Temporary Character Death, in which Nile copes and cries; finally, in which Nile gets to hear her mother's voice again, on grieving
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:01:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26634775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quecksilver_Eyes/pseuds/Quecksilver_Eyes
Summary: Nile doesn’t cry about her mother or her brother or Jay or Dizzy or dying in the arms of what loves her. She doesn’t cry about the storm in Andy’s eyes or the death in Booker’s bones, she doesn’t wake up heaving with the taste of Quynh’s screams in her mouth. She doesn’t cry about Joe and Nicky in tandem, with their laughter stretched across them, she doesn’t cry about Lykon and the shadows of his death sitting in her guts.She cries about dropping a mug.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Nile Freeman & Everyone
Series: We're not meant to be alone [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1906879
Comments: 32
Kudos: 172





	heimweh.

Once, Nile’s mother refused to drown on the south side of Chicago, clinging to the lifeboat of her spine and her two good hands and her childrens’ love; steel and bone. She’d kept her head above the water, and her children close to her chest, kept her voice and her mouth and her prayers on her tongue. Now, she is drowning in Nile.

Nile doesn’t cry about her mother or her brother or Jay or Dizzy or dying in the arms of what loves her. She doesn’t cry about the storm in Andy’s eyes or the death in Booker’s bones, she doesn’t wake up heaving with the taste of Quynh’s screams in her mouth. She doesn’t cry about Joe and Nicky in tandem, with their laughter stretched across them, she doesn’t cry about Lykon and the shadows of his death sitting in her guts.

In the end, she drops a mug in a safehouse in São Paulo. The coffee seeps into her socks and into the carpet, and suddenly, Nile’s throat is heavy with tears. The slash on her throat that did not leave scar nor stain on her skin, feels like it’s ripped open again, gushing blood, and Nile grabs it. Her hand comes away dry.

There’s a breath caught in her teeth and her clavicles are wet and salt stained, her dry hands trembling with all the weight of the ocean atop her. Nile stands in the living room with coffee-wet feet and hollow bones, and cries about the shards on the floor.

Somewhere in Chicago, her mother is drowning again, somewhere halfway across the world her loves lie in the dust of her dried blood, somewhere off the coast of England, Quynh’s lungs are lined with salt. Somewhere, cramped into a chair through that door, Andy never really sleeps, somewhere in this flat, Joe grabs for his faith with untrembling hands. Somewhere in these streets, Nicky is haggling for their groceries with his mouth curled and his eyes like glass.

Somewhere in Chicago, her brother is an only child.

She doesn’t call Booker. Instead her phone chimes softly in her pocket. Nile doesn’t wipe her tears to unlock her phone, her chest a heaving, painful thing by now. There’s a new message – an audio file and a string of emojis from the number Booker used last.

_I know you said you only wanted an apology, but maybe this helps you. Listen when you’re ready._

The file is titled _South Side of Chicago_ and Nile doesn’t touch it for days. Instead, she helps Nicky sort groceries and Joe paint, changes Andy's bandages and learns how to grip a sword, a scimitar, a labrys without trembling at the core from it all. They take turns cooking, and Nile gets up early with her hands wrapped around her throat or her stomach or –

Joe hugs her with all the heat of the sun high above them, Andy smiles at her with all the determination of a life spent dying and living, and Nicky bets on Andy’s palate every time he brings back something sweet. Nile trains until her muscles burn.

She sends Booker a picture of their view of São Paolo. He sends her back a picture of the sea.

Nile calls him.

She doesn’t listen to the audio file saved on her phone until Booker finds them in a safehouse in Cairo, with Quynh and her trembling hands. That day, when Quynh sits tucked into Andy’s lap, with her ear pressed against her chest and her fingers on her pulse point, Nile unravels her headphones with her heart caught in her throat. She drops her head on the backrest of the sofa and presses play.

“I think”, says her mother, and Nile can immediately smell her perfume; like flowers and herbs and the feeling of being rocked to sleep. She takes a breath. Joe puts a hand on her shoulder.

Nile closes her eyes and listens to her own eulogy, wrapped in her mother’s love.


End file.
